Barbie/Ken breakup spurs Mattel to sustainability action

Last week, Ken broke up with Barbie in a rather public way, hanging a giant banner from the Mattel headquarters in El Segundo that read, “”Barbie: it’s over. I don’t date girls that are into deforestation.” Nearby, a shocked Barbie (AKA San Francisco resident Elise Nabors) was arrested while driving a pink skip loader.

The hi-jinx were orchestrated by Greenpeace as a launch of a campaign to pressure Mattel to stop using packaging obtained from Asian Pulp and Paper, a division of the notorious Sinar Mas, which faces an onslaught of criticism for its clearcutting of Indonesia’s rainforests.

The move struck some Mattel employees as entertaining enough that they gathered around windows and snapped photos.

On Friday, Mattel responded, abandoning its arrangements with Sinar Mas and calling on its other suppliers to “clarify how they are addressing the broader issue in their own supply chains.”

Greenpeace, however, is holding out for Mattel — the world’s largest toymaker — to develop and implement a sustainability policy.

Indonesia’s rainforest is home to endangered orangutans, tigers, elephants and clouded leopards. In the last 50 years, roughly 40 percent of the forests have been cleared, mainly for palm oil plantations and paper operations. Sinar Mas is involved in both industries.